


The King and the Corpse

by justlikedaylightsavingstime



Category: Supernatural
Genre: ..and Gavin, But not technically drabble because its too long, Crossroads mythology, Crowley Backstory, Crowley and Feelings, Crowley and his humanity, Crowley hates Fergus, Drabble, So really its a drabble that got out of control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-16
Updated: 2014-05-16
Packaged: 2018-01-24 23:32:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1620965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justlikedaylightsavingstime/pseuds/justlikedaylightsavingstime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Warning for Season 6 spoilers) Crowley discovers that playing dead leaves him with an awful lot of free time on his hands and so he decides to dig up a ghost from his past. Set just after 6x10, but refers to later spoilers too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The King and the Corpse

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration at the end. Essentially just playing around with a different perspective on crossroads demons. It was meant to be a drabble and got slightly out of hand (surprise surprise). One day I will manage to not write ridiculous amounts. I started writing it just before 9x21 came out so that kinda spurred me on.
> 
> It's not an amazing literary piece or anything, it's just something I quickly wrote as practice for writing in the present tense and with more of a horrory/suspensey style. So as per usual any tips/comments are extremely welcome.

You can also read this on my [LJ account](http://roastspud.livejournal.com/1535.html).

The wind ghosts softly against his ear, brushing his cheek with a light caress. He grounds the sole of his meticulously polished shoes into the dusty mud of the crossroads. Against his better judgement he’s here. Answering the call. He can physically feel it, demanding bony hands driving through his flesh and dragging his soul to this god forsaken corner of the planet.

Each echoing step is swallowed up by the miles of overgrown weeds and heather. The niggling fingers of time have barely touched the miles of bitter wilderness over the last three centuries. He doubts that the nearby small town wankers have been any more accepting of modern civilisation than the surrounding shrivelled plants. They always were a ridiculously barbaric, backwards community. He broods over the craggy heath, listening to the howling of some nightime predator. The place is almost devoid of human habitation. Even now, in the age of enlightenment, the stupid humans still fear to build on such cursed ground.

The shadowy forms of mountains creep off into the distance, only interrupted by the occasional looming skeleton of a tree. He can feel the growing temper of the wind with each of his hurried strides. Almost there.

No human has called him here tonight. At least no living human. Tonight he is free from the ever predictable pleas of pathetic souls, just begging for the chance to pay his pricey interest rates. This urgent call is of an altogether different nature. It tugs at his essence with almost enough force to wrench the red mist from his vessel. The summons of a crossroad demon had always resembled more of an irritating ringing, persistent but ignorable. This is the primeval booming of a hunting horn, vibrating through his core and scratching to tear apart his very fibres. This has nothing to do with the job, this is personal.

His shoes crunch to a stop in front of a barely distinguishable mound of earth. Suddenly his own heavy breaths are obscured by the whimpering of the wind.

The King of Hell refuses to believe that his arrival at this spot heralds any form of sentimentalism. Yet seeing the little drowned whelp again after all those years has undeniably plunged Crowley into long corrupted memories of past lives. He had been honest when he said he loathed the little bastard, but the monster knew how to take him back down memory lane.

There had been a time, back in his human days (he represses a sneer at the very thought) when that loathing had been based in something stronger, more soppy, coated in guilt and shame. Now the hatred merely stemmed from his ill begotten spawn’s ability to dreg up the ghost of Fergus bloody MacLeod. He had thought that that snivelling shadow was long behind him, stolen by Lilith and replaced with something far more powerful, more useful. In a time barely memorable that guilt-ridden drunkard had shed his rotten cocoon to reveal the steely majesty that he was now and he had never looked back. Lilith had given him purpose, showed him his strength. And look at him now, the King of Hell.

Yet here he is, mulling over thorny flashes of memory. Nights sat by his mother’s knee, endlessly pounding herbs. The empty thrill of satisfaction when he had sold the Mayor on his new poncey suit for twice its worth. Smashing wine bottle after wine bottle into Gavin’s thick head, offering no apology to those judgemental staring eyes the next morning. The burning scarlet eyes of the crossroads demon as he had tasted her icy lips. The disappointingly numb gin soaked experience of testing out his newly engorged prize. The cold dread of fear as the hell hounds had descended on him to drag him home. That fear had been his last true human sensation.

Now, putting aside his sudden urge to visit this place, he has been successfully purged of such weakness. He isn’t quite sure what to expect, nor why he’s here. He is tempted to set off on his merry life-ruining way after coldly considering the mound, but something holds him back.

Gavin had brought out these swirling thoughts. For several weeks he’d been resisting the niggling feeling in the back of his head, burying himself in work and illicit deals. At least until Castiel had burned his ‘remains’, basically putting him on pause, forcing him to lay low and leaving him with a lot of free time on his hands. So what if he’d zapped himself over to Scotland. He keeps telling himself that he’s just looking for something to do, that it doesn’t involve Gavin’s influence.

God, fucking clueless angel. ‘saving’ him from the Winchesters. It wouldn’t have made a difference if the numbskulls had burned their little trophy. Like he’d have let squirrel and moose dig up the one thing that could kill him. In fact, cloaking himself in darkness and watching them dig through his supposed grave had elicited a thrill of hilarity and voyeuristic excitement. The clowns had had no idea what they were doing.

This spot has long been forgotten by any God, real or imaginary. Few creatures ventured over the thorny mound, instinct driving them back to safer pastures. The crescendo of the gale has finally built up to an almost unbearable level, screaming murder through his ears. This accompanied only by the memory of voices drifting through the centuries. Heralding his belated arrival to this godforsaken spot. The final resting place of the King of Hell.

He can feel the draw of his rotted humanity calling him down through six feet of dirt, weeds and worms. Taunting him. Reminding him of what he used to be. His weakness. His pain. Crowley can almost conjure up the sense of the sharp sting of the wooden stake lodged through his rib-bones, no longer piercing his decomposed heart. There’s the barest hint of feeling coursing through his veins as he considers the indignity of spending eternity buried face down facing towards hell. Although he couldn’t argue that it was fitting.

Humans have some peculiar rituals. Back in the day, all of his fellow townspeople’s best efforts had done nothing to stop his reanimated witchy corpse plaguing them with his wickedness. Crowley almost snorts over the irony. If it wasn’t for them he probably wouldn’t have had the drive to fight tooth and nail on his way up through the hierarchy of hell. He would be downstairs, some lesser known demon doing the dirty work for a load of incompetent fat-cats. Each puny self-righteous member of his burial with the audacity to mark him as a witch had paid for their crimes several times over. Most of them are still enjoying his best hospitality in the unrelenting tropics of hades. Yet thanks to those same townspeople here he is, walking the earth and revelling in the mayhem.  
And with a little help he is going to use his new fresh-from-purgatory-soul-battery to cement his position for eternity. He will finally be able bid adieu to this long forgotten rotting corpse.

He fights the pull of the bones for a little longer. Deep down under his thick hide he fears their taint. He cast off Fergus MacLeod many lifetimes ago. Yet here he is. He briefly lays his body against the mound, not realising what he’s doing. Ignoring the crumpling of his exquisitely pressed suit he embraces the cold crumbly earth.

Crowley bows his head, whispering into the darkness. Words brush through his curled lips tainting the air around him. Slowly he pulls back, eyes not moving from the dirty grave. He collects his thoughts with a sombre expression.

The wind howls harder, nipping at his exposed skin. A delicate, almost wistful, smile passes his lips as he considers his lost humanity. He leans his head forward in a gesture easily be interpreted as supplication or prayer. He softly opens his lips. Expressions of revelation and exultation grace his features as he settles further back. He lifts his head to the heavens and without further embellishment launches a heavy lump of spit onto the ground with a malevolent force.

The King of Hell falls clumsily to the floor with a body shaking cackle. His ears seem to be torn to shreds in the resulting frenzy. The gale blows around him with a bone-chilling wail until it suddenly stops dead, leaving him with an empty ringing noise reverberating through his brain.

After a few disconcerting moments the pressure on his chest shifts, leaving him panting in dizziness. As his head clears a newfound relief breaks through his system, chasing out whatever harrowing force had been plaguing him. Gently his essence settles itself back into his vessel. He feels ridiculous, humiliated. What a fool. Crowley quickly scrambles to his feet, dusting off his assaulted suit. Looks like his drycleaners will be having a heyday.

But as he shakes himself off with a smooth stretch Crowley starts to feel his old vitality sweeping back into his bones and can’t bring himself to care. Well, he can only guess that the moment is over. What a shame. The earlier drag on his soul has evaporated. All he feels now is a faint disdain, a muted anger. And a fresh sense of purpose. The thought sends him into another gleeful laughing fit.

Fuck Gavin. Fuck the villagers who desecrated his corpse. Fuck the Winchesters. Fuck humanity for that matter. And most of all fuck Fergus MacLeod. He has more important things looming on the horizon. People to kill, dreams to ruin. But first things first, Crowley’s got a delicious date with an fucked-up angel.

**Author's Note:**

> I got the inspiration for this from some articles I was reading about witches/suicides etc being buried at a crossroads face-down and with a stake through their hearts so that they couldn't come back and haunt the living. So I thought, what if this was how crossroads demons were born, by being interred by a crossroads. Which then led me to the idea that Crowley as the son of a witch could also have been labelled a witch and buried this way when he died, thus explaining how he became a crossroads demon. If he was buried at a crossroads, Sam and Dean wouldn't have dig up his real bones in 6x04 which made me think his 'death' was the perfect time to set it, particularly since Gavin had just resurfaced. It may have been done before, but ahh well.


End file.
